Monday, September 28, 2009

LONDON SOCIALIST HISTORIANS GROUP SEMINARSAUTUMN TERM 200912 OctoberRoger SeifertBert Ramelson and the communist way: powerful theory made real and real theory made powerful9 NovemberTerry WardClass struggle in Shakespearian England7 DecemberGareth Dale20 years since the events in Eastern EuropeSeminars take place on the above dates at 5.30pm in the Pollard Room at the Institute of Historical Research, Senate House Malet St WC1 ; further information from Keith Flett: keith.flett@btinternet.com; 07803 167266

Thursday, September 24, 2009

I looked at a copy of Class in Education: Knowledge, pedagogy, subjectivity edited by Deborah Kelsh, Dave Hill and Sheila Macrine yesterday. This is an excellent book in my view, and I urge to buy it and/or get your library to stock it!

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

Dear FriendsYou might find interesting and useful (and especially for teaching purposes) an inexpensive ($18 or less if ordered via http://www.rdwolff.com) new book of short, 1000-word essays on the history and dimensions of the current economic crisis as well as government responses and political implications. The essays were published from 2005 through mid-2009 on the Monthly Review webzine and are here edited with new introductions for maximum clarity, brevity, and accessibility to many audiences. The book can already be ordered and will begin shipment Sept 30, 2009.Rick Wolffhttp://www.rdwolff.com

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Capitalism Hits the Fan: The Global Economic Meltdown and What to Do About ItRichard WolffPublished 2009 • 6” x 9” • 256 pages • charts ISBN 9781566567848 • paperback • $18.00A breathtakingly clear analysis that breaks down the root causes of today’s economic crisis... “With unerring coherence and unequaled breadth of knowledge, Rick Wolff offers a rich and much needed corrective to the views of mainstream economists and pundits. It would be difficult to come away from this… with anything but an acute appreciation of what is needed to get us out of this mess.” —Stanley Aronowitz, Distinguished Professor of Sociology and Urban Education, City University of New YorkCapitalism Hits the Fan chronicles one economist’s growing alarm and insights as he watched, from 2005 onwards, the economic crisis build, burst, and then dominate world events. The argument here differs sharply from most other explanations offered by politicians, media commentators, and other academics. Step by step, Professor Wolff shows that deep economic structures—the relationship of wages to profits, of workers to boards of directors, and of debts to income—account for the crisis. The great change in the US economy since the 1970s, as employers stopped the historic rise in US workers’ real wages, set in motion the events that eventually broke the world economy. The crisis resulted from the post-1970s profit explosion, the debt-driven finance-industry expansion, and the sequential stock market and real estate booms and busts. Bailout interventions by the Federal Reserve and the US Treasury have thrown too little money too late at a problem that requires more than money to solve.As this book shows, we must now ask basic questions about capitalism as a system that has now convulsed the world economy into two great depressions in 75 years (and countless lesser crises, recessions, and cycles in between). The book’s essays engage the long-overdue public discussion about basic structural changes and systemic alternatives needed not only to fix today’s broken economy but to prevent future crises.Richard Wolff has been a professor of economics at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst since 1981. He has been a visiting professor in the Graduate Program in International Affairs, at the New School in New York since 2007. Wolff’s major recent interests and publications include studies of US economic history to ascertain the basic structural causes of the current economic crisis and the examination of how alternative economic theories (neoclassical, Keynesian, and Marxian) understand and respond to the crisis in very different ways. His past work involves application of advanced class analysis to contemporary global capitalism. He has written, co-authored, and co-edited many books and dozens of scholarly and popular journal articles. His recent analyses of current economic events appear regularly in the webzine of the Monthly Review. In 2009, Capitalism Hits the Fan, the documentary on the current economic crisis, was released by Media Education Foundation (http://www.mediaed.org). Visit http://www.rdwolff.com for more information.Olive Branch Presshttp://www.interlinkbooks.comTable of ContentsIntroduction

Part I: Roots of a System’s CrisisThe Political Pendulum Swings, the Alienation DeepensDividing the Conservative CoalitionEconomic Inequality and US PoliticsReform vs. Revolution: Settling AccountsExit-Poll RevelationsReal Costs of Executives’ Money GrabsThe Decline of Public Higher EducationReversing the American Dream: Old Distributions, New Economy (co-author Max Fraad-Wolff)Today’s Haunting Specter, or What Needs DoingTwenty Years of Widening InequalityNeoliberalism in Globalized TroubleEvading Taxes, LegallyConsumerism: Curses and CausesNominating Palin Makes SensePart II: The Economics of Crisis1 Capitalism as a Crisis-Prone SystemCapitalism’s Three Oscillations and the US TodayFinancial Panics, Then and NowNeoliberal Globalization Is Not the ProblemEconomic BluesCapitalist Crisis, Marx’s ShadowWall Street vs. Main Street: Finger Pointing vs. System ChangeCapitalism’s Crisis through a Marxian LensIt’s the System, StupidGM’s Tragedy: The System Strikes BackCrises in vs. of Capitalism2 The Role of Economic TheoryEvangelical EconomicsFlip-Flops of Economics3 Markets and EfficiencyOil and Efficiency MythsThe Rating Horrors and Capitalist “Efficiency”Market Terrorism4 Wages, Productivity, and ExploitationUS Pensions: Capitalist DisasterThe Fallout from Falling WagesReaping the Economic WhirlwindOur Sub-Prime Economy5 Housing and DebtPersonal Debts and US CapitalismUS Housing Boom Goes BustWhat Dream? Americans All Renters Now!6 Government Intervention in the Economy Bernanke Expectations: New Fed Chairman, Same Old, Same Old Federal Reserve Twists and TurnsAs Rome Burned, the Emperor FiddledPolicies to “Avoid” Economic CrisesLotteries: Disguised Tax Injustice7 International Dimensions of the CrisisImmigration and ClassGlobal Oil Market DangersChina Shapes/Shakes World’s EconomiesGlobalization’s Risks and CostsForeign Threat to American Business?US Economic Slide Threatens MexicoPart III: Politics of the Crisis1 Reforms and Regulations as Crisis SolutionsEconomic Reforms: Been There, Done ThatRegulations Do Not Prevent Capitalist Crises2 Debates over “Socialist” SolutionsEconomic Crisis, Ideological DebatesSocialism’s New American OpportunityThose Alternative Socialist “Stimulus” PlansWanted: Red-Green Alliance for Radically Democratic Reorganization of ProductionCapitalist Crisis, Socialist Renewal3 Anti-Capitalist PoliticsEurope: Capitalism and SocialismThe Urban Renewal Scam for New OrleansFrance’s Student-Worker AllianceLessons of a Left Victory in FranceThe Minimum Wage, Labor, and PoliticsFrench Elections’ Deeper MeaningMass Political WithdrawalCapitalism Crashes, Politics ChangesIndex

Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Critical Education is an international peer-reviewed journal, which seeks manuscripts that critically examine contemporary education contexts and practices. Critical Education is interested in theoretical and empirical research as well as articles that advance educational practices that challenge the existing state of affairs in society, schools, and informal education.Critical Education is an open access journal, launching in early 2010. The journal home is http://www.critical education. org

Critical Education is hosted by the Department of Curriculum and Pedagogy at the University of British Columbia and edited by Sandra Mathison (UBC), E. Wayne Ross (UBC) and Adam Renner (Bellarmine University) along with collective of 30 scholars in education that include: Faith Ann Agostinone, Aurora UniversityWayne Au, California State University, Fullerton Marc Bousquet, Santa Clara University Joe Cronin, Antioch University Antonia Darder, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign George Dei, OISE/University of Toronto Stephen C. Fleury, Le Moyne College Kent den Heyer, University of Alberta Nirmala Erevelles, University of Alabama Michelle Fine, City University of New York Gustavo Fischman, Arizona State University Melissa Freeman, University of Georgia David Gabbard, East Carolina University Rich Gibson, San Diego State University Dave Hill, University of Northampton Nathalia E. Jaramillo, Purdue University Saville Kushner, University of West England Zeus Leonardo, University of California, Berkeley Pauline Lipman, University of Illinois, Chicago Lisa Loutzenheiser, University of British Columbia Marvin Lynn, University of Illinois, Chicago Sheila Macrine, Montclair State University Perry M. Marker, Sonoma State University Rebecca Martusewicz, Eastern Michigan University Peter McLaren, University of California, Los Angeles Stephen Petrina, University of British Columbia Stuart R. Poyntz, Simon Fraser University Patrick Shannon, Penn State University Kevin D. Vinson, University of the West Indies John F. Welsh, Louisville, KYOnline submission and author guidelines can be found here: http://m1.cust. educ.ubc. ca/journal/ index.php/ criticaled/ about/submission s#onlineSubmissi ons

About Me

I am a Visiting Fellow in the College of Social Science at the University of Lincoln. I was previously a Visiting Scholar in the Department of Education at Anglia Ruskin University (2014-15). Prior to that, I was previously a Senior Lecturer in Education Studies at the University of Northampton. My interests are in Marxist educational theory, the future of the human and social time. The Rikowski family web site, The Flow of Ideas can be found at: http://www.flowideas.co.uk,
My Wordpress blog, 'All that is Solid for Glenn Rikowski' is at: http://rikowski.wordpress.com,
Glenn Rikowski @ Academia: http://independent.academia.edu/GlennRikowski
@ ResearchGate: http://www.researchgate.net/profile/Glenn_Rikowski